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You’re ambitious, you know your music is amazing and going to change the world. Unfortunately not everyone you meet might share that view and may in fact decline to help turn you into a global superstar.

But fear not, everyone hears an unmistakeable ‘No’ along the way at some point. Just look at these now super famous artists who felt the cold hand of rejection only to emerge much better off later: Read more

Who are KKS?
We are three guys just doing our thing, mrpduvet, Majoren and President P, creating music we can proudly say is ours.

How old are you all and where are you originally from?We are 23 to 24 years old and we live in a place in west Sweden called Uddevalla & Trollhättan. Originally all of us are come from a small place called Ödeborg in Dalsland.

What is your musical background and when did you start with music? How did the group come together?We’ve always been involved in music in one way or another, ever since we were kids. Individually we’ve produced and recorded music since we were 12 to 13 years old, but we as a group started kickin’ for the first time for about 6 or 7 years ago now. Back then it was very popular to make Hiphop/rap on electronic beats, so we decided to follow that new generation. The 3 next years we split and didn’t record anything for a time until the fall of last year when a friend called us and hooked up a gig in our hometown Uddevalla. After that we decided to regroup and go back to the basic influence of Hiphop.

Who inspires you?It’s not really who inspires us, it’s what just what comes to mind. And we got a lot on our minds, really! Haha.

Do you find yourselves being inspired by similar things or do you complement each other by having different inspirational sources?We’re all inspired by the same type of music, although the songs always end up different than we thought they would in the beginning.

What inspired your latest release?Our latest song (FVCK) was inspired by how we live at the weekends really.

How has the response and reactions to it been so far?People seem to like it, it’s not really our sound but we think it worked out great with Adam Gozdzik.

What were your expectations?Usually we try not to have high expectations but of course you hope for a hook up of some sort.

Swedish hip-hop duo Mofeta & Jerre are pioneering a new music innovation called ‘Lagom till löning’.

What this means is each month they will produce brand new music in time for the monthly pay-day, so you’ll always have the money for the download! Aren’t they clever? The project is their challenge, to create and release a new song each month by the 25th.

The idea is to keep the music fresh, new and fun – and for their fans to follow them on a monthly basis.

The January release is called ‘Musiken’ is now available in all online music stores. You can listen to it here, on Spotify.

Touring can be so very exciting as well as very daunting indeed. To give yourself the greatest chance of success make sure you prepare everything as best you can. It wouldn’t be a bad idea to keep these 5 things in mind as well.

1. Van RentalYou’re not going to able to tour if you can’t get anywhere. If you decide to take the train to all the venues then your drummer really isn’t going to like you. Planes can be very expensive and not very fuel efficient. It looks like the only option is to rent a van or a bus. Make sure that when you’re doing this it’s big enough, it fits all your gear and for god sake make sure at the very least one of you can drive it!

2. Gig venuesWhen deciding which venues you are going to play you will want to keep in mind the capacity with regard to how popular your band is. It’s probably a good idea not book Wembley Stadium just yet, unless you are in the Foo Fighters. . . are you, can we have your autograph? Stick to smaller venues to begin with, use mailing list data to work out in which towns you’ll find it easier to sell tickets and research what walk-in sales they usually get. If it’s an established venue then that might pull in new people which means an extended fanbase for you. Bonus.

3. Pulling in an audienceIf you are thinking about touring there is a good chance you already have something of a fanbase but you will still want to expand it. When you’ve booked the venues in, use google and find out about the local radio stations, local papers and magazines. Email them and tell them that you are coming to the area, lots will be very responsive to the idea of interviews. Do it well and bring in a new audience. Also contact the venues ahead of time and make sure they put posters up around the venue. Sounds obvious but you’d be surprised.

4. GeographyThis may seem like quite an obvious thing to mention but you’d be amazed how often professional tour managers get it wrong. If you are doing a gig in Paris one night try to make sure you’re not in Ukraine the next night and then the night after that in Ireland. This is obviously a large scale problem but it exists in a smaller more localised way for smaller tours. Make sure that you try and book venues that are close to each other so that you can move in one direction. You will be tired playing shows every night anyway, try not to travel more than you need to.

5. MerchTouring in the early stages of your career is not going to mean you can finally afford a Kanye West style engraved marble coffee table. This is more about building profile, so if there is the chance you can make some extra money then that is absolutely what you should be doing. Merchandise is a fantastic way to get a bit of extra cash. It’s a good idea after you have played to go and sit at the merch stall as a band, people will want to come over and say hello, therefore buying more stuff. Also any bit of merchandise that people buy will serve as a reminder of the great time they had at your gig. It’s a no brainer.

We’re delighted to announce that Mountain Bird are the first band to be signed by Universal Music Sweden from Spinnup.

The wonderfully talented Adam Öhman and his band are now a part of the Universal Music family. Adam was discovered in the spring of 2013 by Spinnup scout, Amanda Brink whilst gigging in Kalmar.

Mountain Bird released ‘Youth Blood Pt.1’ in the spring of 2013 and in the autumn of that year ‘Don’t Mind’, the song that would take this young artist’s career to the next level was released. The track was played on BBC Radio 2 and was named “Track of the week” by XFM.

Mountain Bird will release their EP ‘cosmos I’ on February 5th, and if you just can’t wait for that you can listen to his Spinnup releases here.

Stay tuned for more! If you want to know the full story about how Mountain Bird came to be signed to Universal Music, read the official press release (in Swedish).

Her distinct and beautiful Finnish-Swedish tunes have made their way into our hearts. This week Spinnup’s happy to introduce Frida Andersson.

Who is Frida Andersson?
I’m a Singer/songwriter. I’ve released two albums, ‘Sister’ (2012) and ‘Håll mej hårt’ (2014) on my own label, Casual Friday Music. My debut album ‘Busy Missing You’ (2009) was released on Cosmos Music Group.

How old are you and where are you originally from?
I’m 25 years old and I’m from the Southern part of Finland, from a small town called Ekenäs. I’m a Swedish-speaking Finn, so my mother-tongue is Swedish. For the last three years, my home town has been Stockholm.

What is your musical background and when did you start with music?
When I was a 3-year-old kid, I would perform in front of people together with my sisters and my father. Daddy is a troubadour so music was always present in my childhood. I wrote my first song at the age of 16, that’s also when I started learning how to play the guitar. Before that my main instrument was classical piano..

I moved to Sweden after I graduated from High School (2006) and attended a one-year Singer/songwriter course at Kulturama (Stockholm). It was an amazing year!

Practically one year after I bumped into my record deal with Cosmos Music Group. I must admit that Kulturama was the real starting point of my career. There I realised that I wanted to live for and with music and create it as a full-time profession.

Who inspires you?
Everything! Everyone! It has sort of become my lifestyle, to be open to things that happen around me. My friends inspire me of course, some ex-boyfriends as well, also just random people on the streets. I love to sit down at a café and silently observe others behavior. I try not to behave too suspiciously incase people think I’m a spy. I live my life with all my tentacles out, so to speak.

What inspired your album ‘Håll Mej Hårt’?
My first two albums are in English. This time I wanted to try something new. It was sort of a coincidence that I started to write in Swedish though. My good friend went through a nasty break up and I wanted to write a song that would give her courage to carry on. Maybe because I got so touched by her story, the words came out in the language of my feelings. I tend to write my songs for others and then later when I read my lyrics, then I can see I kind of wrote them for me also.

How has the response and reactions to the album been? What were your expectations?
This ‘write-in-Swedish-thing’ is so new for me, so I don’t think I had many expectations really. I’ve had a lot of wishes and dreams though. I received an award last year from Swedish Radio channel, Vegapriset and for ‘the woman artist of the year’ in Finland. I´m happy with the response I’ve got on the album so far and I’m glad they choose to play my songs on the radio.

What’s happening in the new year?
My wish is to get to tour Scandinavia with my new material. Last year I toured some cities in China with my album Sister. I’m afraid they don´t appreciate my ‘Mumin’ accent over there, haha..

I’m working together with my PR assistant on things at the moment. I’ve done a lot of interviews and more are to come. We’re also working on a gig schedule for Spring/Summer. I try to live for the day and hope I can continue to live on my music!

Understand what you are good at and know when you need the help of others.

There are many out there with artistic dreams and plans to take over the world with their music. In many cases, some will attempt to do absolutely everything themselves which, to some extent, is required in the beginning to have something to show off. But there will always come a time when you have to stop and ask yourself, am I doing enough?

If we assume that you have a cool personality and an awesome voice, you’ve come a long way. The next step is then to look at the songs you write, to make sure they’re good enough. If maybe they don’t quite match the quality needed then perhaps it is time to begin working with someone who you think writes better lyrics and melodies?

Do you have someone who produces and mixes your music? If you think it’s fun and feel you are getting better and better, continue. But if you want to finish a song to show to people in the industry, then a professional production and mix is very, very important .

A&R’s on the label are very spoiled when it comes to the sound quality of the songs they get pitched to them. The ‘demo’ is dead. For you to be taken seriously, the sound quality of your song should be able to compete with what’s played on the radio.

Do not underestimate how important it is to ask for help!

Talk to studios and producers about what it might cost. You can get away with it quite cheap. Today, many production and audio schools with high standards, are filled with students who are up and coming producers. For not too much money, you are guaranteed to help raise your songs to the next level. If you are not willing to invest a dime in packaging your songs in a PLEASANT way, it is perhaps a signal that you are not 100% willing to bet on your musical career either.

Think about what your strengths and weaknesses are in music, and turn then to others for collaboration.

HOW TO GET YOUR MUSIC ON

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